I work at a pizzaria. The recipe we use for crust is 16-1/2 lb of flour, 1 lb of yeast, 3 oz of salt, 4 cups of oil, 16 cups of water. My question is how do I make the crust more crisp. We make 10-inch pizzas. Can you please help?

 Have you thought about making 10-1/2-inch pizzas? We’re only partly teasing. One of the ways to make your crust crisper is to make it thinner, so either use a little less dough for the same size pizza or stretch it a bit more. Assuming you don’t want to invest in new pizza pans, serving dishes, and a bigger take-out boxes, perhaps a little less dough would be the best bet.

Another option is to raise the cooking temperature, which will make the crust crisper. We would experiment one at a time with the thinner crust or higher temperature, until you find that one or the other or both produces just the crust you’re looking for.

You might also experiment a bit with your recipe. We find that a mixture of all-purpose flour and semolina flour produces a great crust. The proportion we use would have you substituting about three pounds of semolina flour for regular flour in your recipe.

Finally, don’t give your pizzas a chance to steam once they’re cooked. With all those delicious toppings, the only place for moisture in the crust to escape is through the bottom. So don’t set it on a cool, impervious surface when it comes from the oven. Put it right in the box or consider serving it in a pizza pan with a perforated bottom, so the steam has some way to escape.

And you might want to learn how to spell pizzeria, just in case it ever comes up….

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